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Let Hillary Run...and Run...and Run

It's time for Democrats to stop trying to bully Hillary Clinton into quitting the presidential race. It won't do any good, for one thing, and it's only going to get her supporters all riled up. If Democrats want to do something constructive to limit the damage from several more months of campaigning, here's a suggestion.

Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean hit the nail on the head (video) when he proposed not that

Superdelegates, the only people with any power left in the Democratic marathon, could be the enforcers. All they have to do is band together and insist they will decide how to cast their all-important votes strictly on the quality of the campaigning from here on out. They should make it clear that they will be looking at only one thing -- who makes the best case for beating McCain. They should subtract points from a candidate every time he or she or a surrogate makes some slimy comment about the other. Points will only be awarded for making the case against McCain.

I don't happen to be of the mind that this campaign has been any more negative than other intra-party fights, and I think a lot of the worry by Democrats is really just fatigue. It's not that it's too late to unite behind the winner -- It's just that it seems like the race has gone on forever and it's time to stop. But Democratic Party leaders will do themselves more harm than good if they try to cut Hillary off at the knees. Her support only gets stronger when the "guys" in the party seem to be ganging up on her. So if I were a Democrat, I wouldn't aim for an early ending -- I'd aim for a positive ending that doesn't involve shooting your candidate in the back.